Cooking and other culinary stuff

[Xantar]

I know at least one person here likes to cook. So let's show off our skills, talk about food appreciation, and share some tips.

For me, I really love to cook when I get the chance. Since I live alone, there isn't really that much opportunity and I'm usually just left making a pasta sauce which I eat over several days. In my day, though, I was known to do tuna steak and avocado salad with lemon pasta or steak with fresh tomato lime salsa. One of the advantages to living in a house with a bunch of recent college graduates is you have a captive audience who will eat pretty much anything you throw at them.

Lately, I've been making cakes. Here are two (http://www.purevideogames.net/images/food/mango_mousse_1.JPG) pictures (http://www.purevideogames.net/images/food/mango_mousse_2.JPG) of my attempt at a mango mousse cake.

So what do you like to make, and how did you get started cooking?

[Typhoid]

I cook all the time. I just like doing it. I've been cooking for myself since I was about 14, and especially more so when I was 18 and moved out.

When I cook I don't follow any type of written instructions, I'll get an idea of what I want to do, then just think "What would go good with/in/on this" and sort of go from there.

The thing I like making the most is sushi. My sister showed me how to do it years and years ago, and I at last make one 'batch' (Around 4 hefty rolls, and various rice balls and whatnot) of sushi every month. It's easy to do, and has ridiculous customization abilities.

The thing I don't do is bake. I'll applaud you for that, but I've never been into it. It's too precise. You can't really just wing anything with baking, or else your cookie will come out like a rock.

But I just like making food for people. I know I'm good at it, and something about food brings people together. I love BBQ's or any type of friend-oriented grill-style fest.

[Bond]

The thing I like making the most is sushi. My sister showed me how to do it years and years ago, and I at last make one 'batch' (Around 4 hefty rolls, and various rice balls and whatnot) of sushi every month. It's easy to do, and has ridiculous customization abilities.
If you ever have some free time to type out your sushi recipe with instructions you would be my favorite person in the world.

[Xantar]

The thing I don't do is bake. I'll applaud you for that, but I've never been into it. It's too precise. You can't really just wing anything with baking, or else your cookie will come out like a rock.


Well, once you learn the fundamental chemistry of a recipe, you actually can play around with it a lot. If you have a good and reliable recipe for basic yellow cake, for example, you can do a reasonable interpretation of about half of the other cakes you might care to make. Substitute cocoa powder for part or all of the flour and you have chocolate cake. To make carrot cake, use oil instead of butter and brown sugar instead of regular sugar, then add spices to taste. Sure, it's always good to have a recipe to tell you exactly what to do (and it's always easy to find recipes on the internet these days), but when you understand the chemistry that makes up a cake, you can read a recipe and figure out if it sounds like it will come out too dense because the ratio of flour to eggs and water doesn't sound right.

Also, cheesecake is very adaptable. If you have a good, reliable recipe for cheesecake, you can add whatever you want to it and just taste the batter to make sure it's good before you bake it. Got some maple syrup and pecans? Toss them in. It'll be good. Got some left over limes? Throw in the zest from the limes for key lime cheesecake.

And then once you've made your cake, all the fillings and frostings can almost be improvised. For example, the mousse part of a mango mousse is just mangoes, sugar, whipped cream and gelatin. I essentially mixed the first three together by taste, then measured how much volume I had and added the appropriate amount of gelatin.

It's probably worth noting that I'm not very good at cookies. You can cover a less than ideal cake with decorations and frostings that will still make it taste and look good. With a cookie, all you've got is that one shot at baking properly.

Oh, and I second Bond's request for sushi tips.

[TheSlyMoogle]

Well I got into cooking a couple of years ago for a few reasons:

1. I was going to fast food places like every day twice a day at least, and rarely did I eat anything other than double cheeseburgers or fried crispy chicken sandwiches. I dreamed of doing that when I was a kid, but once I did it for six months things were just downhill.

2. I started to put on a lot of weight due to the combination of beer and fast food. Let's say about 35 pounds in a semester. (From 140 to 175) I knew things needed to change, and I started to wonder if I could cook, if it was really that hard to do, and if I could do it in a healthy manner without losing flavor or eating the same thing every day.

3. I had originally enter college under a chemistry major, and I changed, but I missed doing the experiments in Chem labs because that stuff is fun and interesting, and there's a lot of chemistry in cooking.


So I started looking for healthy recipes online, doing a lot of food research (Especially like High Fructose Corn Syrup, trans-fats, etc and how they affect a normal body). I started doing a lot of research on spices and things to see what was good for you, what wasn't (Turns out there's hardly any spice that isn't good for you, you just have to watch how they're processed), and also started just trying all the healthy stuff. Turns out for a fair price you can cook and eat fairly healthy and tasty. So I generally cook around the start of the week for things that I want during the week as far as planning around work and stuff. It's worked out pretty well so far, and it's a lot of fun for the most part. Doing dishes blows, but Sometimes if you cook for people they'll help or just do them hehe.

I like cooking meals for people, but have yet to perfect the art of healthy snacks. Those that I make are generally big misses. I've started to figure that snack food just has to be junk for your body.

Also I'm not big into baking and sweet stuff, however if you have dessert recipes and things that are healthy I would be glad to learn, as I think my usual desserts of fresh fruit done in some way are starting to bomb. All the recipes and stuff I had some up with are on my computer at home but would be glad to share some healthy recipes.

[Vampyr]

Now that I'm done with college, I am planning on cooking almost every night. The majority of my college career has been spent either eating out or cooking extremely fast meals (pasta, anything with the word "helper" after it).

I also own a George Forman grill now, so that will open up a lot of possibilities for preparing healthy meats.

I actually enjoy baking more than other types of cooking. I like for things to be very precise, so it's easy for me to measure out exactly what a recipe calls for, mix it together, then bake it for however long it says. Plus it requires less active attention, once you know how hot your oven runs compared to other ones.

I would be interested in some cheesecake recipes, or any kind of cake really.

[manasecret]

Tips for Sautéing - Oil Choice

The term sautéing comes from the French and means essentially 'jumping', as in, when you first put the food in, you should see the oil "jumping" out of the pan. You make the oil very hot, and the food you're cooking should be cut thin/small so that it cooks quickly.

The oil is supposed to get very hot before throwing the food in. That is where oil choice becomes important. You need an oil that will withstand high temperatures without burning. You've all smelled that burnt oil smell. Not good. Here are some good and bad oils that I know of for sautéing.

Good
Pure Olive Oil
Bad
Virgin/Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Despite popular belief, virgin olive oils are not good for sautéing since they do not withstand high heats well. Pure olive oil, on the other hand, can, and it's cheaper. Virgin olive oils are meant for tasting, with bread and such.

Good
Grape Oil. Expensive, but withstands high temperatures as well (not any better than olive oil, though).

Know any others?

[Typhoid]

Sushi is actually pretty easy and straightforward.

For the rice, I cheat. I just use a rice cooker. But before putting the rice into the cooker, put it in a strainer and run it under cold water and get out as much of the starch as you can (Unless you are using 'sushi grade' rice, then you won't need to).

Then you need to have your seaweed wrap laid out on the bamboo-rolly thing (Which you don't need to make the sushi unless you're just starting, I suppose. I personally don't use it, and roll by hand).

Do it near a tap that you have with a slow stream of cold water running, just so you don't need to keep turning it on and off - wet your hand a little, and then wet the seaweed. Not to the point where it's decimated, but you don't want it to be flaky.

Then blanket rice (depending on how thick you want your roll to be) on top of the seaweed. It's best not to go from edge to edge to edge to edge if you're just starting out. Especially leave maybe a half/quarter inch on the side opposite of you, and a finger-widthish on each side, just to keep it easy.

(The way I find easiest to get rice onto the seaweed is to wet my hand so the rice doesn't stick to it [or else the rice will definitely stick to you], roughly put some on the seaweed and then flatten the rice out with a utensil, such as a rice-spoon-thing.)

Then just put whatever you want laid out however you want it laid out on top of the rice. You can put it all on the part nearest to you, or you can put it uniformly along the whole thing. This obviously depends on what you're using.

After all that, you're ready to roll.
You start with the edge closest to you and just roll. It's really that simple. Picture it like rolling a burrito without folding the ends in on itself.
If your seaweed isn't sticking to itself after you roll it, hold it shut, wet a finger or two and dab along the edges, and then utilize the bamboo carpet-thing and roll it with some pressure.

As for what to put in it, that's all preference. Same with what type of seaweed to use. Right now I have 3 different types, 2 Japanese and 1 Korean, and they all work and come out the same way. There are subtle flavour differences, so aside from trying it yourself you won't know.

If you'd like, you can also add some rice vinegar and/or sugar to the rice after it's cooked and before you start using it. All preference and what you're used to, again.

Another sushi-type thing that I like making is ridiculously simple that I learned from my friends Japanese dad when I was little.

Just cut a sheet of seaweed in half, put a small bit of rice in the middle, if you'd like, put something inside, and then roll it into a ball. Dip it in sauce, eat it, etc.

As for "what side of the seaweed do I use" thing - shiny or dull, I actually have no idea anymore. I just stick 'em down and roll 'em up. They both work the same for me.

[Angrist]

Tips for Sautéing - Oil Choice

Good
Pure Olive Oil
Bad
Virgin/Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Despite popular belief, virgin olive oils are not good for sautéing since they do not withstand high heats well. Pure olive oil, on the other hand, can, and it's cheaper. Virgin olive oils are meant for tasting, with bread and such.

Good
Grape Oil. Expensive, but withstands high temperatures as well (not any better than olive oil, though).

Know any others?

Aah, those colors make me want to play a Mafia game again...

As for cooking... I like it when I take the time for it. Usually I keep it simple (but healthy [and vegetarian]).

[Seth]

I've started making sushi with brown rice only now. It actually works and tastes just as good. And i think it's supposed to be the shiny side out.

I like substituting rice for yam sometimes, sprinkled with lots of turmeric. Curry gnarliness, but it's an excellent anti-inflam if you're working out or whatever.

manasecret: Coconut oil is probably the best oil for cooking with, even better than grapeseed. Make sure to get the dme pressed stuff, not the powder processed kind. It used to be the mainstay oil for popcorn n shit but back in the day some asshole released a study on how saturated fat is a killer, so people switched. The taste was jolting at first, but now I can cook it with anything and enjoy the coconut flavour. It's the best on skin too, for sun exposure or moisture.

I like sprouting grains and dehydrating the dough for some crazy raw goodness. Baked bread with pumpkin seeds, flax, etc. I love fresh baked bread.

A few weeks ago I made a banana blend with lots of cinnamon and a bit of nongmo soy lecithin. After having it in the fridge for the day i took it out and it had the consistency of pumpkin pie guts. It tasted like it would be awesome in a pie so I'm gonna try again and go with a coconut cream whipped top.

I use dates and stevia as sweeteners.

I try to combine hempseed with some meal each day, usually breakfast. 11 grams of protein per 30g srving, perfect 3-6-9 ratio for the human body. Manitoba harvest has the best stuff, far higher quality protein source than meat or whey. I like making a chocolate paste using coconut oil, raw cacao, coffee ground hemp seeds and either blackstrap molasses or dates. Sometimes agave. I also like grinding up chia seeds, if I want it to be more of a post workout snack.
My vita-mix blender just broke. Luckily my family has a blendtec which is super good at fucking food up too, but the vita-mix is overall a better blender because it has a speed dial which allows for a slow start, unlike the blendtec which busts the blades off the bat and sprays the contents all over the inside of the blender. It's a noticeable bitch to clean but worse than that if there's a bunch of uncreamed ingredients high up on the blender walls then it kind of either gets wasted or has to be scraped down. Just so you know if you're in the market for a highend blend.

green smoothies. Kale, lemon, ginger, spinach. All good. My parents have a really good twin gear juicer, and i wouldn't have believed it but broccoli juice is tasty straight.

[Xantar]

So I found a cheesecake recipe that some people I trust swear by. I can't attest to it myself because I'm lactose intolerant and thus don't bake cheesecake.

You will need a food processor or mixer, a 10 inch springform pan, and a large oven safe container of some sort which is big enough to place the springform pan inside.

Crust:
1/4 pound (1 stick) butter
2 cups graham cracker crumbs
1/4 cup sugar

Batter:
2 pounds (4 packages) cream cheese
1 1/2 cups sugar
4 eggs
Pinch of salt

Pre heat the oven to 350 degrees. It is very important for your oven temperature to be correct, so consider using an oven thermometer.

Line the outside of your springform pan with tinfoil (this will make sense later).

To make the crust:

Melt the butter. Combine it with the crumbs and sugar. You can do that in a food processor or just mash stuff together in a large bowl with a fork. Press into the bottom of your pan.

To make the filling:

Whip the cream cheese at high speed until it's silky smooth (about 5 minutes). Add sugar and whip for another 2 minutes. Add the pinch of salt. While mixing at low speed, add the eggs one at a time until they are just incorporated.

Pour batter into pan with the crust. Place the pan in the larger container and then fill that container with water about halfway up the sides of the springform pan. Bake for 50 minutes. You know you're done when the sides of the cake are set but the center still jiggles a little if you shake the pan. Turn oven off and let the cake sit inside for 10 minutes. Then put the cake in the refrigerator.

Before trying to remove from the pan, let the cake stand at room temperature for 10 minutes.

Now here's the thing about cheesecake: once you have this recipe down, you can easily modify it with whatever flavors you please. To make chocolate cheesecake, add 4 ounces of melted chocolate and maybe some chocolate chips to the batter and bake the same way. To make key lime cheesecake, squeeze in the juice of one lime. You can add a mashed banana and a tablespoon of rum. Or throw in some mashed pears with a tablespoon of cinnamon and replace half of the sugar with brown sugar. Whatever you think would taste good probably won't turn out badly.